Farmers to stage Long March if their problems not solved : Siraj ul Haq

Lahore: Ameer, Jamaat e Islami, Pakistan, Senator Sirajul Haq, has  said that if the government did not solve the problems of the growers, the farmers from all the provinces would jointly march to  Islamabad.

Addressing a big Kisan Convention at Phalia on Tuesday, he said that the farming community all over the country was facing difficult times because of high costs of agricultural inputs, high electricity tariff and load shedding. The farmers were not getting due return for their crops. He noted that India was giving subsidy to the farmers on agricultural inputs while the Pakistan government was creating problems for the farmers by importing agricultural products from India.

The JI chief appealed to all the political parties not to fight among themselves and instead, wage a war against poverty, ignorance, price hike, unemployment and load shedding. He reiterated that the JI after coming into power would give subsidy on five items including fertilizer, seed, pesticides, electricity and diesel to the agriculturists.

He said it was a matter of shame that the government had failed to protect the minorities and Churches.  He said that most of the security men were on VVIP duty while the masses were at the mercy of the criminals and terrorists. He said that Pakistan had been established in the name of Islam but the rulers had drifted it away from Deen and created a class based society.

He said that a few families had been ruling the country for the last 68 years. They had been amassing wealth and building properties abroad. The rulers had shackled the nation and the country in huge loans secured from the IMF and World Bank on most humiliating terms and the nation had to pay huge amounts in interest on the foreign loans. He said that the prices of energy, and other items were raised every now and then to collect revenue for meeting the huge budget deficit which led to price spiral.  He said the common man did not get clean drinking water while the ruling elite enjoyed every facility in their palaces.

Senator Sirajul Haq said that he wanted to open the doors of the President House, the Prime Minister and the assemblies to the common man, but added that to achieve this end, the masses would have to say farewell to the vaderas and capitalists and repose trust in the honest and competent leaders of the JI.

Speaking on the occasion, JI Punjab chief Dr Syed Waseem Akhtar, he would continue to raise the voice of the farmers in the Punjab Assembly till their rights were secured.

The Kisan Board Pakistan chief Sadiq Khan Khakwani, in his address, the kisans would stage Long March from Sadiqabad to Islamabad in October next for their rights. He demanded interest freed loans to the growers, and fixation of the support prices of different crops before the harvest.